Cayenne and its chili pepper relatives get their genus name of Capsicum
from a Greek word that means “to bite,” referring to the hot bite of the
fruit. The word “cayenne” itself is thought to come from kian, which
is the name of another pepper known to the Tupi Indians that occupied
what is now French Guiana and where the capital city is Cayenne. Cayenne
and other chili peppers are also sometimes called Guinea spice, a
corruption of the reference to its origin propagated made by 16th
century explorers.
